John 8:48-59 - Before Abraham Was I Am - The Mysteries of God's Word

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They accuse Jesus of being a Samaritan. They say He has a demon. And instead of backing down, He answers with a promise that reaches beyond the grave: “If anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.” We’re in John 8:48–59 on the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles, with the pressure rising and the lines getting clearer between true discipleship and hardened unbelief.

We walk verse by verse through the insults and the deeper issue underneath them: honor. Jesus refuses to play the reputation game, and He points to the Father as the one who judges rightly. From there, the conversation turns to Abraham, and we explore why the leaders can only see the physical while Jesus keeps pressing the spiritual reality of faith, promise, and eternal life. We also dig into what it means to “know” God, contrasting head knowledge with real, lived, experiential relationship.

Then comes the flashpoint: “Before Abraham was, I am.” We connect Jesus’ words to Exodus 3:14 and explain why the crowd immediately reaches for stones, understanding this as a direct claim to the divine name, Yahweh. We also note the irony of law-keepers breaking the Law in their rush to destroy Him, and why Jesus’ escape signals that His time has not yet come.

If you care about the deity of Christ, the Gospel of John, and what Jesus really claimed about Himself, this conversation is for you. Subscribe, share this with a friend, and leave a review with your biggest takeaway.

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Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_00 (00:15):
Grace and peace to you.
Thank you again for joining mefor the mysteries of God's Word.
Today we are in John chapter 8.
We're going to begin at verse48.
And again, the context of thisis the last day of the feast of
tabernacles.
This is six months before Jesuswould be crucified.

(00:37):
And on this last day of thefeast, Jesus has been talking
and preaching to many people.
He just gave his I am the lightof the world proclamation, and
the Jewish leadership has comein and begun to question and
attack him.
Jesus has made many declarativestatements to those who were

(00:58):
believing in him.
He said, If you abide in myword, you are truly my
disciples, and you will know thetruth, and the truth will set
you free.
But the Jewish leadershipcontinued to attack him,
attacking Jesus' character, andJesus told these Jewish leaders
that they were children of theirfather the devil.

(01:21):
So this conversation has gottenvery deep and it has gotten very
heated, and today we pick up atverse forty eight, which reads
The Jews answered him, Are wenot right in saying that you are
a Samaritan and have a demon?
Jesus answered, I do not have ademon, but I honor my father,

(01:44):
and you dishonor me.
Yet I do not seek my own glory.
There is one who seeks it, andhe is the judge.
Truly, truly I say to you, ifanyone keeps my word, he will
never see death.

(02:06):
In these first four verses fortoday, we see the Jews continue
to attack Jesus in thisconversation.
They begin by asking him if he'sa Samaritan and he has a demon.
Of course, this is not a sincerequestion.
It's a further attempt todiscredit Jesus publicly.

(02:27):
The two ultimate ways tolambaste, to trash talk, or to
cut to bits a Jewish leader wasto call them a Samaritan or to
claim that they would have ademon.
The Samaritans had mixed withthe Gentile nations, and they
had disregarded all of theprophets of the Old Testament

(02:50):
except for Moses.
And in the Jewish culture, theSamaritans were the epitome of
apostasy.
Furthermore, to claim someonehad a demon was to declare that
they were mentally unstable,that all of their teaching was
false.
And the Jewish leadership woulduse these attacks against anyone

(03:14):
that would appear to be athreat.
They used them against John theBaptist as well.
You can read in Matthew 11 18that when John came, neither
eating nor drinking, they saidhe had a demon.
And we see throughout theGospels that these Jewish
leaders had been advancing thisidea that Jesus had a demon.

(03:40):
But Jesus answers, I do not havea demon.
That I honor my father, and youare dishonoring me.
So the Jews' attempts todiscredit and dishonor Jesus are
not only an attack on him, butan attack on Father God.
Here we see that Jesus doesn'tattempt to create a personal

(04:04):
defense.
Instead, he points to how hestands before his heavenly
Father who judges all thingsrightly.
And Jesus says, Truly, truly, Isay to you, if anyone keeps my
word, he will never see death.
Jesus declares that anyone whobelieves on him and keeps his

(04:26):
word will have eternal life.
They will never see death.
Picking up in verse fifty-two,the Jews said to him, Now we
know that you have a demon.
Abraham died as did theprophets, yet you say, If anyone
keeps my word, he will nevertaste death.

(04:48):
Are you greater than our fatherAbraham who died?
And the prophets died, who doyou make yourself out to be?
In verses 52 and 53, it is veryclear that these Jewish leaders
only saw the physical.
They argued that because theprophets died, because Abraham

(05:12):
died, Jesus must be mentallyunstable.
He must have a demon and bepossessed, in order to claim
that people would never die.
When they asked Jesus, are yougreater than our father Abraham?
This is posed in the Greek textwith an expectation for a

(05:34):
negative answer.
It might be better translated,You're not greater than our
father Abraham who died, areyou?
The Jewish leaders were lookingfor more evidence, more evidence
so they could solidly convictJesus of blasphemy.

(05:54):
They were already fully awareand terribly outraged that Jesus
was making himself out to beequal with God the Father.
Picking up in verse fifty four,Jesus answered, If I glorify
myself, my glory is nothing.

(06:14):
It is my Father who glorifiesme, of whom you say he is our
God.
But you have not known him.
I know him.
If I were to say that I did notknow him, I would be a liar,
like you.
But I do know him, and I keephis word.

(06:35):
Your father Abraham rejoicedthat he would see my day.
He saw it, and he was glad.
Verses fifty four through fiftysix are packed with information
showing how Jesus has a truerelationship with not only
Father God, but with Abraham.

(06:58):
How Jesus is in a right and truerelationship with true Israel,
and these Jewish leaders areoutside of it.
Jesus says, If I glorify myself,my glory is nothing.
Jesus condemnsself-glorification, and he
points out these Jewish leadershypocrisy.

(07:21):
The relationship of the Son ofGod has always been, will always
be perfect unity with God theFather.
It is completely impossible forGod in his very nature to break
the purity of his unity in theTrinity.
Jesus points to how the Fatherglorifies him because of the

(07:46):
intimate relationship betweenFather and Son.
The scripture itself teachesthat it is impossible for God to
deny himself.
God is the same, yesterday,today, and forever.
But then Jesus says, You havenot known him.

(08:08):
And Jesus uses a very distinctword for know here to show the
difference between hisrelationship with the Father and
these Jewish leaders who onlyhave head knowledge of the
Father.
When Jesus says they have notknown him, that Greek word for

(08:28):
known means to have known byexperience, implying acquired
knowledge.
Jesus is telling these Jewishleaders that they do not have an
acquired knowledge of God theFather.
Then Jesus says, I do know him.

(08:49):
And that Greek word means toknow inherently or intuitively.
Jesus has this intimaterelationship with the Father by
his very nature.
It's inherent to the nature ofthe Son of God to know Father
God.
Finally, we begin to get intothese incredible statements that

(09:13):
Jesus makes about Abraham.
In verse 56, Jesus says thatAbraham rejoiced that he would
see my day.
What an amazing statement byJesus.
It reveals that Abraham rejoicedthat one day he would see the
coming Messiah.

(09:34):
While Abraham was known as thefather of nations and the father
of faith, Jesus makes it clear,Abraham's faith was not simply
rooted in physical promises, itwas rooted in the coming
Messiah.
Abraham trusted and believedthat a Messiah would come from

(09:56):
the seed of Eve to crush theserpent's head.
In fact, the Apostle Paul makesthis very clear in his epistles.
Abraham is the father ofspiritual Israel, believers,
much more so than he is thefather of physical Israel.
Romans four sixteen reads,That's why it depends upon

(10:22):
faith, in order that the promisemay rest on grace and be
guaranteed to all of hisoffspring, speaking of Abraham's
offspring.
Not only to the adherent of thelaw, but also to the one who
shares in the faith of Abraham,who is the father of us all.

(10:44):
What is that faith of Abrahamit's speaking of?
Its Gentile faith.
Abraham believed and was countedrighteous before God for many
years before he was ever evencircumcised.
Abraham is the father of all whobelieve because Abraham came

(11:04):
from a life of idolatry.
Abraham himself was like aGentile, and then through his
line came Israel.
He is indeed the father of allIsrael.
And Jesus says that Abraham sawthe day of Christ from afar.
Abraham received the promise andsaw the continuation of the

(11:28):
lineage that was to bring aboutthe Messiah.
And Abraham trusted in God'spromise through faith.
But not only this, the Lordforeshadowed for Abraham every
aspect of the life of Christ andhis eternal kingdom.
The scripture records that theLord appeared in the flesh to

(11:52):
Abram on multiple occasions.
God brought forth a childthrough a barren woman,
foreshadowing the virgin birth.
Abraham was willing to sacrificehis son, his only son, of
promise to foreshadow God'ssacrifice of his only son.

(12:13):
Abraham saw the Lord ascend intoheaven, as Christ would one day
ascend into heaven before hisdisciples.
Abraham saw the wrath of God onSodom and Gomorrah, which is
symbolic of the day of the Lordand his wrath to come on the
earth in the last days.

(12:33):
And finally, the promised landthat was promised to Abraham is
an eternal promise that Abrahamand all of his true descendants
who would believe would inheritan eternal land forever.
And while the promised land ofCanaan became their land, it is

(12:55):
only a shadow, a type, aforeshadow of the eternal
kingdom for Abraham's true seed,those who have faith in the
Messiah.
Picking up in verse fifty seven,so the Jews said to him, You're
not fifty years old, and youhave seen Abraham?

(13:18):
Jesus said to them, Truly, trulyI say to you, before Abraham
was, I am.
So they picked up stones tothrow at him, but Jesus hid
himself and went out of thetemple.
In our last three verses fortoday, we see how this

(13:39):
discussion between Jesus and theJewish leaders ends up.
The Jews, seeing only thephysical, say, Jesus, you're not
even fifty years old yet.
What they're basically sayingis, Jesus, you haven't even
reached your first Jubilee.
You're not even an old man yet.
We know from Scripture thatJesus was about 30 years old

(14:02):
when he began his ministry.
And these Jewish leaders say,And you have seen Abraham?
These Jewish leaders understoodwhat Jesus was implying.
While Jesus had not outwardlyclaimed to have seen Abraham,
his statements were statementsof fact as if he had, and the

(14:22):
Jews were looking for a way totrap him.
And then, in no uncertain terms,Jesus declares himself to be
Yahweh, Jehovah God, the God ofthe Old Testament.
Jesus had been using thisexpression I am previously with

(14:44):
his disciples, and with othersto express that he was the
source of life.
But here he does so in thecontext of saying he existed
before Abraham was alive.
Jesus doesn't simply say beforeAbraham was I was, rather he

(15:06):
uses a present tense.
He says I am.
This is a claim of selfexistence that only God can
claim a phrase that God usedwith Moses at the burning bush.
When Moses asked, God, what isyour name?

(15:28):
What am I to tell those whenthey ask me what is your name?
And God said, I am who I am inExodus three hundred fourteen.
Jesus' claim here is that he isYahweh.
He is the God that spoke toMoses.
He is the God that is above,over and outside of time itself.

(15:54):
So they picked up stones tothrow at him.
Now the punishment for blasphemyaccording to the law was to be
stoned.
The Jewish leaders felt thatthey had accomplished their
goal.
Jesus has openly claimed to bethe God of the Old Testament,
and they knew it.
There was nothing ambiguousabout what Jesus had just

(16:15):
claimed, and to them this wasblasphemy of the worst kind.
They were immediately ready tostone Jesus for blasphemy
without even a trial.
It should be noted that mobmentality stoning without a
proper trial and withoutwitnesses brought forth was

(16:37):
against the law of Moses,against the law of God.
That could be found inDeuteronomy 17, two through
seven.
So these Jewish leaders, whoclaimed to be so righteous and
follow the law of God, weresimply looking for a way to
destroy and kill Jesus without atrial.

(17:00):
But Jesus hid himself and wentout of the temple.
How did this happen?
We can't be certain.
The phrase that Jesus hidhimself could be referring to
some kind of supernatural meansof escape, or somehow dulling
the minds of these Jewishleaders as this conflict is

(17:20):
arising.
But we can't be certain of that.
Perhaps during the conflict,confusion created a way for
Jesus to escape unnoticed.
What we do know is thatScripture tells us his time had
not yet come to be crucified.
So God provided a means by whichhe was able to get away.

(17:51):
Join me next week as we pick upin John chapter 9 and Jesus
healing a blind man.
God bless you this week.